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They cursed and shouted, and I heard Thana in their voices. Saw her in their eyes. In the one on the right’s slender hands, and the one in the middle’s sharply chiseled jaw. They were mortal still. Not but children by Fae standards.
“What is it?” Finn asked.
My heart clenched, “They’re Thana’s sons,” I breathed.
My hands curled to talons at my sides. Shaking.Gods damned fool!I wanted to scream in frustration. How could I kill her children? Even after what she’d done to me. Even if they sharedhisblood, too.
I squared my shoulders at Ricon, who had begun to shiver from the icy chill running up his arms from where his hands were still encased in thick crystal ice. The skin within the blocks turning black. “Tell them to drop their weapons.”
For a moment, it was almost as though the madness left him, and I was staring into the face of a father who would do anything to save his sons. Not the monster of a moment before.
“Hand over your weapons,” he called to them through my onslaught of wind, “Do as they say.”
“Father!” The silver haired one shouted, his face twisting.
“Do as I say!” he commanded, and the three boys discarded their swords, daggers, and a bow onto the dirt.
“Take them,” I shouted to Alaric, releasing the last of the wind from my body, my legs shaking with the effort of standing.
My guardians took hold of them, locking their arms tightly behind their backs.
“You won’t kill them,” Ricon said, more a question than a statement.
You can’t…the thought scratched on the inside of my skull.I know your mind, I can see inside it. I know what you hide. That a child grows within you. You can’t take the lives of mine. I can see it. You won’t.
My skin turned to ice. My throat went dry. How had he known? I wasn’t even certain I’d admitted it to myself. But I’d feltstrangefor days now, perhaps weeks even. I wasn’t sure, and I had no way of knowing whose father the child was or if it were even true.
But he was right about one thing. I wouldn’t kill them. Because unlike Ricon, I was not the sort of monster who killed children. The youngest one looked as though he hadn’t even begun to grow hair on his face. No—they would live. But no where near me or Meloran.
“Take them away,” I commanded Alaric, “No child should have to witness the death of their parent.”
“No! Please,” one begged.
“Leave him alone!” the youngest whined, his eyes brimming with tears.
But I couldn’t bring myself to believe that Ricon was anything less than a monster as a father than he was a monster to everyone else he encountered. These poor young males simply didn’t know any different. I told myself they would be better off without him
Tiernan drew seeds from a small pouch at his waist and bound their hands and feet quickly with thick vines he grew, weaving them around their wrists and ankles before handing them off to Kade and Finn to carry back to the palace.
The cries of battle still sounded in the distance, but they were less and further apart. It was almost over. And the skies were clear of Draconians save for a few baring the mark of the Night Court. They would be safe enough to fly back. “Be careful,” I told Kade and Finn, “Take them to the dungeons.”
Ricon nodded gravely to his sons, once, slowly. The only goodbye he would give them. And then they were gone. Shouting and screaming from the sky as my Draconians carried them off on black wings shining with flecks of bronze in the light of the setting sun.
“Thank you,” Ricon said, bowing his head.
A half laugh bubbled up from some dark place within me. Alaric moved to stand beside me, placing a hand on my shoulder to lend me strength I didn’t need. “Don’t thank me,” I hissed at him. The anger returning, bringing a haze to the edges of my vision.
How dare he thank me. How dare he take advantage of my kindness. After all he’d done. All the lives he’d taken and families he’d ruined. Villages he’d burned along the way. How many of my people would be left homeless because of him?
“You will still die on this day. And your children will never set foot on Meloran again.”
I shook off Alaric’s hand, stepped in and wrenched the Blessed Blade from his belt and the steel chest plate from his torso. His eyes bulged, the pupils constricting just before I drove the blade into his heart.
He choked, gasping, his breaths coming slower, shorter, as I knelt down to whisper in his ear, “Monsters like you shouldn’t be allowed to have children. For their sakes, and for the sake of who their mother oncewas… I pray to the gods they don’t turn out asmadas you.”
The blade did its job, taking his life in swift seconds, feeding his Graces into me. The ground trembled beneath my feet and something like shadow seeped through my skin. My back arched, and my heart raced. Feeling more energized, morepowerfulthan I ever had before. Alaric knocked me away from the blade, my hand slipping from its blood coated hilt.
I took a long shuddering my breath, my vision fading. The flames died around us. And when my vision returned, I found myself wrapped in the arms of Tiernan and Alaric, alone save for corpses in a ring of charred earth.
